5. Chapter Five: Results
5.2. Frequency analysis
5.2.2. Token frequency
Token analysis was carried out for word tokens used in KA spontaneous child speech. Figure 5.3 demonstrates token frequency of all groups of KA consonants grouped according to production manner.
Figure 5.3: The distribution of KA token consonants in target words
Stops and fricatives are the two most frequently targeted consonants in KA child speech, with occurrence frequencies of 28% and 24% respectively, followed by nasals (15%), emphatics (10%), approximants (9%), and laterals (7%). Trill and tap and affricates were the least frequently targeted consonants (5 % and 2% respectively).
The chart in figure 5.4 (below) demonstrates the frequency of occurrence of target consonants that are used by KA speaking children in spontaneous speech in all word position.
Stops 29%
Nasals 16%
Tap/Trill 5%
Fricatives 31%
Approximants 6%
Laterlas 6%
Affricates 3%
Emphatics 4%
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* Marked consonants are considered as non-Arabic, but occur normally in adult speech of KA as a result of phonological assimilation or in intra-dialectal variations.
Figure 5.4: Overall target consonant frequencies in spontaneous speech samples of KA speaking children (Token Frequency)
Figure 5.4 shows that /h/ is the most frequent consonant used in KA
spontaneous speech (8.03%), followed by /n/ (7.52%) and /b/ (7.49%). Several
8.03!
Frequency percentage (%)
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non-Arabic consonants were found to occur among the least frequently used tokens in KA (e.g. /v/, /p/, /ɹ/, /ŋ/); this was evident whether frequency was looked at according to type or token (see section 5.1.7 for discussion).
Word shapes that occurred in more than 1% of total number of words are listed according to occurrence frequency in table 5.4.
Syllables 1;4-1;7 1;8-1;11 2;0-2;3 2;4-2;7 2;8-2;11 3;0-3;3 3;4-3;7 Total 1-syllable 355 264 507 899 866 798 1,085 4,774 2-syllables 675 710 1,177 2,527 2,427 2,297 2,481 12,294 3-syllables 92 66 55 703 657 474 544 2,591
4-syllables 2 2 4 54 38 47 75 222
5-syllables 1 1 3 5
Total 1,124 1,042 1,743 4,184 3,988 3,617 4,188 19,886 Note: Grey shaded cells denote zero value.
Table 5.4: Target word-length occurrence count across age groups
It can be seen in table 5.4 that disyllabic words were most frequently targeted words followed by monosyllabic and trisyllabic words; whereas monosyllabic words predominates the production of children acquiring English at this age (Dodd, 1995; Dyson, 1988; Watson & Scukanec, 1997).
The data presented in table 5.5 shows increase in number of words and length with age. Word shape occurrences were counted and the frequency of each word shape was calculated based on total number of target words. For
example, CVV.CV word shape was targeted 3,846 times; this number was then divided by total number of target words (N=13,888); and multiplied by 100. That is CVV.CV word shape forms 19% of all target word structures.
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* Total number of target word shapes that occurred in frequency more than 1% of all target words (n=5,999; 30%). Note: Shaded cells indicate words that contain one or more geminate (n=1,968;
10%).
Table 5.5: Overall token frequency of target word structures according to length
As was found token type frequencies presented in table 5.3, frequency analysis (table 5.5) shows that disyllabic words are the most commonly used words in KA (60%), followed by trisyllabic (8%) and monosyllabic words (4%).
Words containing geminates are highlighted in grey (table 5.5); the cumulative frequency of all words with geminates is 10%. Gemination is a phonological feature of Arabic; however, the frequency of geminate occurrence has never been reported for Arabic. All Arabic consonants can be geminated and are contrastive in all dialects of Arabic. In KA, all geminates occur in word-medial contexts. Several studies of gemination that occur in other languages have shown that there is a general agreement that duration plays a major role in
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distinguishing singleton and geminate consonants in languages (F. Al-Tamimi, Abu-Abbas, & Tarawnah, 2010; Khattab & J. Al-Tamimi, 2013; Kunnari et al., 2001); in addition to other acoustic and articulatory cues (Hassan, 2002;
Khattab, 2007) that contribute to the perceptual saliency of gemination which may result in early acquisition of geminates in KA.
From table 5.5, it can be seen that CVV.CV word shape is the most frequently targeted word structure. Note that 51% of all CVV.CV shapes are the Arabic pronouns /ˈhaː.ð4/ ‘this’+masculine and /ˈhaː.ði/ ‘this’+feminine which were targeted 1,973 times (out of 3,846 CVV.CV words). The actual frequency of CVV.CV words, excluding ‘this’ pronoun is 10% (n= 1,873); it remains the highest among other target shapes.
The second most frequent target shape is CVC.CV, followed by CVC.CVC. The following examples are selected from the most frequent target words:
CVV.CV /ˈʔaː.n4/ ‘me/I’
/ˈkaː.hi/ ‘here it is’ + feminine /ˈha:.ða/ ‘this’+masculine
CVC.CVC /ˈʔaz.ɾaɡ/ ‘blue’
/ˈʔaħ. maɾ/ ‘red’
/ˈʔaɾ.nab/ ‘rabbit’
CVC.CV /ˈʔin.ta/ ‘you’ + masculine /ˈwaɾ.d4/ ‘flower’
/ˈɡatˤ.wa/ ‘cat’
Word structure increase in both variability and complexity with age (see table 5.4). After the age of 2;4 all groups show marked growth in 4-syllable word use.
Words longer than 4-syllables were only targeted by children above the age of 2;4.
Data in table 5.6 show great expansion of word structure variability after the age of 2;4. In general, the expansion in word length at 2;4 also coincides with
remarkable growth in number of target words (see table 5.2).
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Age
(year;month) No. of target words No. of words containing
geminates No. of different shapes
1;4-1;7 1,125 189 35
1;8-1;11 1,042 58 40
2;0-2;3 1,743 176 51
2;4-2;7 4,184 500 140
2;8-2;11 3,988 557 111
3;0-3;3 3,617 299 149
3;4-3;7 4,188 361 159
Total 19,887 2,140 240*
* The total number of different word shapes that were produced by all age groups collectively.
Table 5.6: Target words shape and geminate occurrence across age groups
From table 5.6, it can be seen that the number of target words increase with age in proportion to increasing word structure variability. The youngest group targeted only 35 different word structures in spontaneous speech, while the oldest group targeted 159 different word structures. The number of geminates targeted did not show similar linear correlation. This variability in word
structures was expected in spontaneous speech samples. Out of all target structures, only five structures containing geminates were used frequently. The following examples were extracted from actual data, and are presented in order according to frequency (1 being the most frequent):
(1) CV.CːV /ˈj4. mːa/ ‘mum’
/ˈba.tˤːa/ ‘duck’
(2) CV.CːVV /ʔa.ˈɫːaː/ ‘Allah’ (God) /mi.ˈnːiː/ ‘here’
(3) CV.CːVV.CV
/ði.ˈbːaː.n4/ ‘fly’ / fa.ˈtˤːoː.m4/ ‘Fattooma’ (name) / xa.ˈlːuː.di/ ‘Khalloodi’ (name) / ħ4.ˈmːuː.di/ ‘Hammoodi’ (name)
(4) CV.CːVVC
/mi.ˈnːaːk/ ‘there’ /tɔ.ˈfːaːħ/ ‘apples’
/da.ˈnːaːj/ ‘move’+feminine /ʕa.ˈbːuːd/ ‘Abbood’ (name)
137 (5) CV.CːVC
/sa.ˈbːaħ/ ‘bathe’ /ˈx4.rɛʕ/ ‘scary’
/sa.ˈkː4ɾ/ ‘close’ /ˈxa.ɫː4sˤ/ ‘finished’
Note that both CV.CːVV.CV and CV.CːVVC shapes are often used as variants of Arabic names in Kuwait and the Arabian Gulf area. For example, the name /ˈxaː.lid/ is often changed to /xa.ˈlːuː.di/ or /xa.ˈlːuːd/ as a nickname often used in child directed speech and casual conversations. The sociolinguistic bases of this common change were never documented in the literature.
5.2.2.1. Stress patterns of target token words:
The growth in word shape variability was reflected on target word stress
patterns. Table 5.7 illustrates wide variability of stress patterns of target words.
Data presented in table 5.7 show clear growth in stress pattern diversity with increasing age. The target words produced by the youngest age group was limited to five stress patterns, whereas the eldest age group targeted eight different stress patterns in complex word shapes. Stress patterns in KA have not been examined in earlier studies, and neither have dialectal variations within KA. Taqi (2009) examined specific phonological variables in Najdi and Ajami variants of KA. However, her investigation did not look at variation in word structure or stress patterns.
Stress pattern 1;4-1;7 1;8-1;11 2;0-2;3 2;4-2;7 2;8-2;11 3;0-3;3 3;4-3;7 Total Sw 447 545 825 1,594 1,565 1,634 1,620 8,230
wS 228 165 352 933 862 663 861 4,064
wSw 91 62 45 542 629 421 450 2,240
wwS 1 3 3 150 28 52 94 331
wwSw 2 2 4 45 30 42 66 191
wwwS 5 7 3 9 24
Sww 1 7 11 1 20
wSww 4 1 2 7
wwwSw 1 1 2 4
wwwwS 1 1
Total words* 769 778 1,236 3,285 3,122 2,819 3,103
15,112
* Excluding monosyllable words. S stands for Strong and w stands for weak syllables.
Grey shaded cells denote zero value.
Table 5.7: Target word stress patterns across age groups
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The following examples illustrate the most prominent variants in word structures that were produced by children in the current study:
(3) a. /smi.ˈʧa/ b. /ˈsim.ʧa/ ‘fish’
CCV.CV CVC.CV
(4) a. /ħa.ˈliʤ.ha/ b. /ˈħalʤ.ha/ ‘her mouth’ + feminine 2nd person CV.CVC.CV CVCC.CV
In both examples (3) and (4) two different word structures imply the same meaning and are often used in two different dialects of KA. Example (a) in both (3) and (4) are commonly used by Najdi KA speakers, while (b) are frequently used by Ajami KA speakers. The sociolinguistic background of this speculation is beyond the scope of this study; thus in the current study the researchers has adapted the target transcriptions to the parent’s dialect to avoid false mismatch between target and actual realisation transcriptions. In other words, the child’s target word was matched to a transcription of the mother’s realisation of the target word.
5.2.2.2. Syllable shape frequency in target tokens:
This section shows findings of syllable shape analysis. A variety of word shapes are possible in Arabic. Syllable shapes that were targeted
spontaneously by KA speaking children are listed in table 5.8. The grey shaded cells in the table indicate syllable shapes that were not targeted by children in the corresponding age group.
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Table 5.8: Syllable shapes occurrence in KA children spontaneous speech.
The number of syllable shapes targeted by children increased with age alongside syllable complexity. The two dominant types are CV and CVC, they account for 62% and 34% of all syllables in KA respectively. The high number of CV types in this table is due to their occurrence in multisyllabic words. Note that syllables listed in table 5.8 are listed regardless of their word position or stress.